Last week, we heard in 1 Samuel
about what had happened to the Philistines after they had captured the Ark of
the Covenant from the Israelites in battle.
You’ll remember that following that capture they were hit by what we
believe would have been an outbreak of the Bubonic Plague, which then of course
would have affected the economic reality of the Philistine towns and then really
every other aspect of life as well. I
dare say that the plague was probably also affecting the Israelite communities
too, the plague isn’t something that usually contains itself to one small
locale. And I’m sure that the Israelites
would have seen that as God’s punishment on them for the losing of the
Ark to their enemies. Not a good
situation overall for anyone. But then
the Philistines, who certainly would have been blaming the Ark for the tragic
situation they found themselves in – because the Ark’s arrival would have been
the newest and biggest change that had happened for them before the plague itself
had arrived – decided that they needed
to return the Ark to where it had originally come from, this way they would
hopefully then rid themselves of their tragic circumstances.

They do return the Ark to the
Israelites at the Jewish town of Beit Shamesh, and so at least the Ark is back
in Jewish hands. But the problem now is
that those living in Beit Shamesh don’t really understand what the proper treatment
and care of the Ark should be. Beit
Shamesh at that time had been very much an agricultural community, it sits
between Ashdod on the Mediterranean Sea and Jerusalem in the mountains. They wouldn’t have had any knowledgeable high
priests living there from the Levite Tribe.
(Today Beit Shamesh is basically a sleeper community for Jerusalem and
Tel Aviv which are both large cities not too far away, although there is some
agriculture in Beit Shamesh too.) And so
after a handful of folks die trying to take care of the Ark – they weren’t
realizing that they had to cover their faces when viewing the Ark – remember here
Indiana Jones once again – they decide that they have to get it to someplace
where not only would they not have to deal with it, but moreover, where it
could be properly handled. Therefore,
the people in Beit Shamesh contact their fellow Israelites in Kiriath Jearim,
not too far away, and ask them to come and take it. Specifically, they get in touch with a man
named Abinadab who they knew was living in Kiriath Jearim and was from the
Tribe of Levi; remember it’s the Levites who had been the tribe appointed by
God to be the priestly class. And so a
group of men come from that town and bring the Ark to Abinadab’s home, they
ordain his son Eleazar to be the priest in charge, and then hope that now all
will be well.

BUT, it’s not, there’s still issue,
the Philistines keep raiding and beating up on the Israelites, there’s constant
problem and turmoil, and no matter who the Israelites are praying to, nothing
seems to get better. Oh wait, what did I
just say? I said, “No matter who the
Israelites are praying to, nothing seems to get better.” And there-in lies the problem.

Think about our own society
today. Our country itself was founded on
religious liberty and freedom, a wonderful concept. BUT, the religious freedom and liberty that
our founding fathers really had in mind was actually ‘religious freedom within
the realm of religion that was found to be acceptable’. In other words, as long as you were some
shade of Christianity, or the token Jew, you were generally just fine. The folks that subscribed to faiths and
belief practices outside of that realm usually weren’t though, and there were
at least a handful of other faith traditions being secretly and not so secretly
practiced, things like divination, and Wicken; remember the Salem Witch Trials
from our school books? And Lord knows it
wasn’t too many that thought that the spirituality of the Native Americans wasn’t
simply some belief system of savages. Overall
though, the far majority of the European population of North America, up until
pretty recently really, would align themselves with some tradition of
Christianity if they had to, whether they were active in church life or not.

But now, today, think about where we
are, and I’m really not trying to negatively criticize here so much, but today
there really is currently something of a free for all when it comes to faith
practices, and I really do have to question the societal health of this
situation. Today, we in our country have
every shade and color on the religious pin wheel represented, but to be honest,
I think, most of it all seems to be really pretty superficial and/or ignorant –
including lots of folks that claim some mantel of Christianity. And I’m not saying that everyone needs to
think and believe and worship as I do, but I would like to put out there that
people do need to be educating themselves about what it is that they say they believe
in.. and that is, educating themselves on a real level and with real effort
about what they say they believe in, because there really are so many varying
ways of thinking about the same thing out there, that it doesn’t seem to be
much of a surprise that we as a people really are as confused as we clearly
appear to be, and that’s unhealthy, and the reason why it’s unhealthy is because
it fractures us and shatters our community.
It causes misunderstanding and misrepresentation that then leads to
resentment, which then leads to conflict, and boy is that where we find
ourselves today; in our families, at our jobs, in our schools, on our streets
and clearly in our government. And I
can’t believe for one second that God is looking down at this and feeling pride
in his creation and joy about how it is that we are with each other.

Well, for the Israelites, this is
pretty much the same exact thing that was going on at that point in time from
our Old Testament reading this morning.
People were praying to various Gods in the hope that at least one of
them had to be right, one of them had to be able to answer their questions and
solve their problems. At this point in time
also, you had a lot of mixing between peoples and ideologies …and with their
theologies. This land where the
Israelites found themselves was very much a cross roads of civilizations; ..that
specific land is where people were crossing through on their ways to and from
Africa and Asia and Europe. And because
of that, the cross breeds of people in that land are really pretty amazing, and
probably only to be compared with our own society’s level of mixing. (And once again I’ll say that I’m not seeing
that as a negative.) But the end result
of all of this, is that you didn’t have Israelites completely staying to
themselves and living behind walls protected from everyone else, you had trade
and relationship and intermarriages as well.
All of the things that naturally happen between people that live within
any kind of proximity to each other. But
for their relationship with God? I know
that we can pretty easily realize how this end result of mixing would actually
affect that relationship. It was very
confused and jumbled, superficial and yes, ignorant – because people didn’t
stay focused on one way of being, and because of that they really didn’t know
what it was that they were believing in or even should be believing in. And so even after the Ark of the Covenant
goes form Beit Shamesh to Kiriath Jearim, the people are still feeling not as
they once had and not as they believed they should, …they still feel pretty far
from God, because they’re still allowing themselves to be pulled this way and
that way by varying beliefs and causes that are in front of them.

Now, enter Samuel into the story
line once again. Until it had been taken
into battle by Eli’s sons, Samuel had been the essential caretaker of the Ark
up in Shiloh which is pretty far north of where the Ark is now finding itself
in Kiriath Jearim. People go to Samuel and ask him what they
should do - he is known as a pretty wise minor judge of the time – and he tells
them that they need to get rid of all of the various Gods that they’re praying
to and falsely relying on, and he insists that they realize that it is their
God, the God of Israel that is the only force that they should really be even
considering as real and true and reliable and able to provide to them what it
is that they need. Samuel is confronting
the people and demanding of them that they finally all get onto the correct
page and start realizing correctly just what it is that they have in front of
them when in true relationship with their creator. He’s kind of calling them out.

If Samuel was amongst us today, he’d
be clearly telling us to stop thinking that we can find all that we need at
either the mall or at Walmart. He’d be
telling us that in order to find real fulfillment in this life, that it’s not
about the new car, or the new cell phone, or computer, or financial portfolio –
that those are things that only give momentary, superficial, and often times,
false joy and satisfaction. And that a
real and honest and intelligent relationship with our God is truly what we need
in order to stop feeling so often, so damn lost…

He then takes those who feel called
to the hill town of Mizpah which is south of Shiloh but north of Kiriath Jearim,
- why there no one really knows – and once there they confess to God for having
allowed themselves to get so far from their God, for having spent so much
effort on false things, and on superficial thoughts, and then Samuel prays to
God on behalf of the Israelite community, praying for them to come together and
to heal the fractures and lesions that have been allowed to grow up because of
everyone being off in every other direction….and then after the people truly
confess to being just so pig headed and stubborn, and self-centered and
self-righteous, and start acting as really they know they should be ..things
seem to start getting better, healing begins to take place and the people’s relationship
with their one and only real Creator begins to solidify once again and starts
giving them what they need…once again.

Samuel is then declared as the main
Judge over Israel and things are turning around, the Philistines are being
fought off, and any other groups too that think that they might be able to do
something are also chased off. And the
people get themselves onto the same page and stay aware of their relationship
with God, they’re not off putting their priorities into superficial things as
much as they had been. And things stay
like this for quite a while, and as happens with all of us, Samuel starts to
grow old, he’s seen as very much the leader of God’s people, and so he starts training his sons to take
his place, like is the tradition. But
then there comes about another big issue, and it’s essentially because people
are not trusting God to deal with their concerns?

But I want to end now this week
without going into the next big thing that first slaps God and then eventually
the Israelites in the face. You’ll
notice in the Scriptures of Samuel that the whole story of the Israelites
acting as the spoiled child of God is now really very well cemented into
place. The Israelites are getting well
used to this relationship with God in which they know that if they complain and
bemoan about something loud enough and long enough that they’ll essentially get
their way. Yes, they get the occasional
punishment, but what’s been put into motion is a way of being in which humanity
– through the example of the Israelites – can never really seem to just put
their faith in God instead of in their own abilities and things that are 99% of
the time, completely superficial. Just
when you think they – we – may be getting a clue as to our place in this creation,
we change our minds and run off to where a better deal is perceived to be getting
offered, and we do it all the time.

Where is our faith, in what do we
put our faith and why? Should our true
comfort and confidence be found in the things of this world, or in that which
is far bigger and greater and beyond all of this that we have in front of
us? That’s a really good question to be
spending some time with, that’s the question that the Israelites were having to
confront then and that’s what they and we are being confronted with today.

And I know what the answer is just as much as I know all of
you know what the answer is, but how do we reflect that answer into our day to
day living, our daily choices and reactions?
Or will we always just be like the spoiled children of God?